CIVILIAN CASUALTIES AND DAMAGE: ISRAEL

According to the Israeli government, there were 18 separate Iraqi missile attacks1 over a 39-day period during Operation Desert Storm, resulting in ground strikes in Israel and the occupied West Bank by 39 missiles.2 In addition, "one or two" missiles reportedly landed in the sea. A spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) told Middle East Watch that "many" of the Iraqi-modified Scud missiles were so poorly constructed that they broke up on re-entry into the atmosphere, resulting in several different "hits."3 This multiplicity of impacts on the ground from a single missile complicates the problem of identifying the causes of damage.

The official Israeli statistics should be treated with
caution. Israel-based journalists told MEW that the numbers provided by
the authorities changed during the course of the war for no discernible
reason. Running totals issued by different bodies -- the IDF, the
Government Press Office (GPO) and the government-run Press Communications
Center (PCC) set up during the war -- were often at variance with one
another, and still cannot be fully reconciled.

This chapter presents a partial view -- not a
comprehensive accounting -- of civilian casualties and damage in Israel
from Iraq's missile attacks. The information was compiled from various
official and unofficial sources, and from eyewitness accounts obtained by
Middle East Watch during a fact-finding mission to Israel in June. Middle
East Watch's reconstruction and analysis of the Iraqi attacks is based in
part on a log kept during the war by a television crew in Israel.

* * *

According to the final official account, 13 Israelis
were killed by the Iraqi attacks: one directly by a missile and another 12
from indirect causes, including heart attacks. However, these figures are
also contradicted. On February 3, at the height of the conflict, Maj. Gen.
Ehud Barak, then IDF Deputy Chief of Staff, spoke of two deaths directly
attributable to missiles and 12 indirect deaths, making a total of 14.
Other official sources spoke, at different times, of three or even four
direct fatalities. Of the 18 attacks listed by official Israeli sources,
12 caused no casualties.

Estimates of injuries varied widely, even among
official sources. Three attacks were said to have caused a substantial
number of injuries: up to 96 were injured in the attack at 8:37 pm on
January 22; up to 67 were injured in an attack at 6:02 pm on January 25;
and another 27 or so were injured in an early morning attack on February
9. By MEW's calculation, the total number of injured civilians ranged from
a minimum of 165 to a maximum of 334.

Of the 18 Iraqi attacks, official Israeli sources
reported that nine caused no property damage. The other nine attacks,
however, were reported to have caused substantial destruction. In Tel Aviv
alone, according to the Hebrew daily newspaper Maariv, over 3,805 apartments were damaged,
including 793 that were badly damaged.4Maariv also reported that in the city worst hit in
the Dan region -- thought to be Ramat Gan -- 1,162 buildings were damaged,
including over 3,700 apartments. Some 28 buildings were totally destroyed,
including 118apartments, and some 701 apartments in 129 buildings were in
need of extensive renovation due to damage.

PATRIOT DEFENSIVE
MISSILES: ADDITIONAL COLLATERAL DAMAGE?

Col. Raanan Gissin, an IDF spokesman, told MEW that
the figure of 39 ground strikes did not include damage caused by Patriots
which either misfired or broke up and exploded on the ground after
striking incoming missiles.5 He acknowledged that Patriots had been
responsible for some damage in the Tel Aviv area, but would not go into
details, other than to point out that the weight of the Patriots was only
a fraction of that of the Iraqi missiles6 and therefore bore
less responsibility for the damage on the ground.

However, not all the damage caused by the Patriots
followed mid-air collisions with the Iraqi missiles. On January 25, an ABC
television reporter in Tel Aviv witnessed through video playback at least
one Patriot rise into the sky from a battery located on open ground by the
Yarkon River, between Tel Aviv proper and the northern suburb of Ramat
Aviv, fly horizontally, below the level of taller office buildings, and
then hit the ground again, exploding on impact.7

The Patriots have a built-in, self-destruct device.
But the device apparently failed on at least this one occasion on January
25, raising the issue of the advisability of locating the air defense
system so close to a major population center. The direction, and angle, of
attack, togetherwith the Patriot's short range,8 meant that
interceptions were inevitably often going to take place over heavily
built-up Ramat Gan, Bnei Brak and Givatayim -- due east of Tel Aviv --
with likely consequences in terms of civilian damage and casualties.
Ironically, one possible conclusion of the evidence gathered is that there
would have been less damage on the ground if the Patriots had not been
deployed (see Chapter Seven for additional information on this
subject).

It can also be argued that, by engaging incoming
missiles suspected of carrying chemical warheads over densely populated
areas, at an altitude that would generate the maximum dispersal of any
chemical or biological agent, the U.S. and Israeli forces used the
Patriots at great potential risk to the civilian population. On the other
hand, there was no relaxation during the war of government warnings to
Israeli citizens to act as if every attack involved a chemical weapon.

A NOTE ABOUT
METHODOLOGY

The purpose of MEW's fact-finding in Israel was to
document the damage caused by the Iraqi missile attacks and determine the
extent to which this damage was the product of Iraqi violations of the
rules of war. Official sources of
information used by Middle East Watch included releases from the
Government of Israel Press Office; Ricochet, a
published compilation of statements issued during the war by the Israel
Defense Forces spokesman; data from the Press Communications Center set up
temporarily during the war; and news broadcasts on the
government-controlled Israel Radio and Television networks. Maariv, a mass circulation daily newspaper,
published a useful, detailed chart of those missile attacks about which
official information was disclosed. But, one week after the attacks began,
the government began to restrict sharply what it permitted to be publicly
disseminated, reducing the value of this and other journalistic
accounts.

Private sources included dozens of Israeli citizens --
residents of affected areas and others, such as journalists, who gathered
information about the missile attacks as they occurred but have not been
at liberty to speak publicly. For obvious reasons, Middle East Watch has
chosen to respect their confidentiality.

During MEW's visit to Israel, four months after the
end of the war, the disclosure of any information about the missile
attacks -- the precise location of impacts, whether military targets were
in the vicinity, the amount of damage caused, and whether the Iraqi
missiles were intercepted by the Patriot anti-missile system -- remained
subject to Israeli military censorship. This constraint inevitably curbed
the scope for independent on-the-ground research and complicated the task
of reaching firm, reliable conclusions. It made Israeli citizens reluctant
to speak in detail to a foreigner about damage in their neighborhoods, and
it made the hunt for those missile impact sites about which least was
disclosed during the war near impossible.

In the Tel Aviv area, a map of known impact sites was
compiled from various sources. Some of these were evidently where entire
missiles had landed. Others were caused by falling debris, including
warheads, from missiles which had been partially destroyed. Complicating
still further the task of assessing Iraq's responsibility was the fact
that in some cases Patriot defensive missiles also fell to the ground.
These often caused considerable damage, and casualties, but no Israeli
official has been willing to admit as much, either at the time or
subsequently. With the lapse of time, it was thus very difficult for
Middle East Watch to make a precise distinction in each case between
damage directly caused by Iraq's missiles and that caused by the Patriots.
All the sites examined had been largely cleared up at the time of MEW's
visit in June.

Five impact sites in various parts of Tel Aviv, Ramat
Gan and the northern suburban districts of Ramat HaSharon and Tel Hashomer
were selected to be visited. Bystanders, local residents and, where
appropriate, shopkeepers and other workers were interviewed. It was
explained to them why Middle East Watch was conducting this research. Most
interviewees were cooperative, volunteering information about such matters
as the extent of warning they had received from air raid sirens, how much
damage had been caused and whether there had been any casualties. However,
it should be emphasized that the sampling was notscientific and the
picture obtained from these eyewitnesses was not necessarily complete.
Some respondents were suspicious about the inquiries, preferring not to
talk to a foreign human rights worker without official
permission.

Interviewees were usually asked whether there were any
military installations in the vicinity that could have been a possible
target for the missile. Most said they did not know of any. Further
information was obtained by driving around the area and by talking to
foreign and Israeli journalists. Several interviewees pointed to the
Kirya, the sprawling Defense Ministry complex which covers more than a
square kilometer in the heart of Tel Aviv, as a likely target, but few
doubted that the attacks were anything other than indiscriminate, intended
to instill panic into civilians.

A CHRONOLOGY OF THE
ATTACKS

The First Attack: Early Morning Hours of January
18The first Iraqi missile attack occurred on Friday,
January 18, at 2:20 am, Israeli time. A total of eight missiles were
launched and all eight were recorded as striking ground. Since the U.S.
Patriot batteries had not yet been installed, none of the missiles was
intercepted.9 Information collected by MEW indicates
that six of the missiles landed in the Tel Aviv metropolitan area and two
struck lower Haifa, not far from the port and its surrounding heavy
industry. There were reports of moderate to heavy damage to civilian
objects. Maariv reported that 668 buildings
were damaged in Tel Aviv, 31 of which were scheduled for demolition, and
1,000 apartments damaged, 45 of which were totally destroyed.10 In
Haifa, 100 apartments were damaged as well as 100 shops and a large
shopping center under construction.11

Reports of injured civilians varied, with 12 reported
by the GPO, 20 reported by the IDF, 22 by the PCC, and 68 by Maariv.12 The Government Press Office and other
sources said no one died, presumably of direct causes. However, three
elderly women and a three-year old Arab child were reported in the Israeli
press to have suffocated to death while wearing their gas masks
improperly, and a fifth indirect death may have occurred.

· tel aviv attacks: civilian damage and possible
military targets: According to information collected by MEW, at least four
of the six missiles launched at Tel Aviv and its vicinity struck
relatively densely populated districts: Ezra, in southeast Tel Aviv;
Givatayim, a municipality east of Tel Aviv; Tel Baruch, in north Tel Aviv;
and Azor/Shikun Hadash, an industrial municipality south of Tel Aviv.

The fifth missile landed in a small suburban shopping
mall, near both the Country Club and a major intelligence headquarters,
under a kilometer away, within the Iraqi missile's estimated "circular
error probable" of 1,000 meters. The explosion caused moderate damage, but
no casualties. Enclosed within a large area of open ground covering
several square kilometers, this secret and highly sensitive facility is
located between the affluent municipalities of Herzliya-Pituach on the
coast, and Ramat HaSharon, further inland.

Middle East Watch visited Ezra, a district in
southeast Tel Aviv where one of the missiles landed. Bordered on two sides
by the Ayalon Highway, an urban section of the Tel Aviv - Jerusalem
highway, and the old main road to Lod, Ezra is located in the southern
fringe of Tel Aviv. It is one of the poorest districts in the city, with
much illegal, unregistered construction. A district of cheaply built, one
and two-story houses with a few small groceries and a bakery, the poor
quality of workmanship undoubtedly contributed to the scale of the
destruction. Ethnically, the district is made up of Iraqi, Yemeni and
Iranian immigrants.

According to Zahava, the 28-year-old headmistress of a
local elementary school, the Amiel Rambam School, about 150 meters from
the impact site, the missile made a direct hit on the house of an old
lady. She was standing at the door of her house to see what was going on,
a few seconds after the alarm was sounded. The blast pushed her outside
and saved her life, while destroying her house entirely. The exact
location has now been cleared of the worst damaged buildings, leaving an
open space of about 1000 square meters.

Zahava herself lived two narrow streets away -- she
estimates that she was less than 100 meters from the impact site -- and
her house was severely damaged. She, and over a hundred others from the
district, were temporarily relocated to 12 small hotels. While those whose
damage was limited to broken windows and shutters have returned, at the
time of MEW's visit in early June many remained in hotels, awaiting the
completion of new government-built housing already going up nearby. In the
midst of the rubble, reconstruction and new one-story row houses stand
scores of freight containers. Each holds the personal contents of one
destroyed house.

Considering that "over 100 houses were completely or
partially destroyed," according to Zahava, the small number of casualties
was remarkable. Both she and another older lady in her fifties, who would
not give her name, said most injuries were cuts and bruises caused by the
blast, particularly from flying glass. Only eight people were taken to the
hospital. The older lady's house was about 300 meters from the impact
site. Her windows were blown in.

Asked whether there were any conceivable military
targets in the area, Zahava laughed and shook her head. "He made a
mistake," she said, referring to Saddam Hussein. On being pressed, she
noted that the Defense Ministry complex known as the Kirya was not far
away in a straight line (about 1.6 km), but she could not come up with any
possible target in the immediate vicinity. The south Tel Aviv railway
station is barely 700 meters away on the outskirts of the city, but it is
little used and there are no indications that this was the intended target
of the missile.

A bakery stands on the edge of the empty lot created
by the demolished and destroyed houses. Israel Wenger, an employee in his
late60's, was working in the building at the time of the explosion at 2
am. "There was just a second's warning," he said, "then the blast." The
flimsy, corrugated iron roof of the bakery flew off, but there was no
permanent damage to the equipment or building. He told MEW he was knocked
to the ground, but unhurt.

An Iraqi military communique issued by the Armed
Forces General Command about the attack used rhetoric that was to
characterize Iraq's descriptions of subsequent attacks:

After relying on the all-powerful and almighty God,
our struggling missile forces pounded political, economic, and scientific
targets in Tel Aviv, Haifa, and elsewhere in Israel. Let the United States
hear the wailing of its daughter implanted in the heart of the Arab
Homeland.13

The Second Attack: January
19The second volley of missiles from Iraq hit Israel on
January 19 at 7:15 am, with perhaps as many as five missiles fired.14
None were intercepted, but only four were recorded as striking ground, and
there was a maximum of three explosions on the ground.15 The number of
injured civilians was variously reported as 10 (IDF), 16 (GPO), 30 (PCC),
and 47 (Maariv). Both the IDF and the GPO
reported no fatalities, but MEW believes two people died of indirect
causes.

Civilian property damage was extensive, with a total
of approximately 1,400 buildings listed as damaged. A community
culturaland sports center was also damaged in the poor Tikva district of
south Tel Aviv.

Brig. Gen. Nachman Shai, the IDF spokesman, said on
January 19 that "a number of surface-to-surface missiles fell in the
Greater Tel Aviv area (Dan Region) and other parts of central Israel."
These terms are quite general, in contrast to later descriptions by the
Government Press Office, which are much more specific.

MEW collected information about three missile strikes
within Tel Aviv proper at this date and time: in Yarkon Park, opposite the
Exhibition Grounds in north Tel Aviv; in Hatikva, in south Tel Aviv; and
on Allenby Street, in central Tel Aviv. However, Maariv spoke of a total of five missiles. It is
therefore reasonable to infer that there were at least two other strikes
outside the city itself, as implied by Gen. Shai, although there is a
possibility that one or more missiles may have broken up in the final
approach, with the parts landing in widely different locations.

One of the locations outside Tel Aviv hit at this time
may have been a restaurant by a gas station in Rishon Le Zion, an
upper-middle-class town southwest of Tel Aviv. Col. Gissin, an IDF
spokesman, told MEW that a missile had struck this particular site, owned
by someone he knew. He noted that Rishon Le Zion marked the southern edge
of what he described as the "killing box" created by the Iraqi attacks.
How much damage was caused and whether there were any casualties is not
known, as MEW did not visit the site.

· the attack in downtown tel aviv: civilian damage and
possible military targets: Middle East Watch collected information about
the missile that landed on Allenby Street in the heart of Tel Aviv's
business district, an area of three-story older buildings dating from the
1930s, with shops below and apartments above, as well as purpose-built
office blocks. The headquarters of some of Israel's leading banks are
within a few hundred meters of the impact site. The Great Synagogue of Tel
Aviv is 100 meters away, on the same side of the road. The Carmel market
-- a crowded district of small stallholders during the week -- is less
than 800 meters away. The city's main post office, which contains
telecommunications equipment, is barely 50 meters away.

The impact site also was 1.3 km in a straight line
from the Kirya. One of the previous day's missiles, which landed on the
borders of Givatayim and Tel Aviv proper, was likewise 1.3 km away from
the Defense Ministry buildings. These two missiles are the two that came
closest to landing near the large complex. Two other missiles -- on
January 19 in the Hatikva district, and January 26 on the beachfront in
central Tel Aviv -- landed 1.6 km and 1.9 km away, respectively.

The January 19 missile landed on a three-story
building, the upper-floor apartments of which were empty at the time. It
went through two floors and came to rest in the middle level, above a
jeweller's and a clothing boutique. In a humorous reference to an attack
which did little damage, the jewelry store has erected a model Scud
missile outside its window, showing it hitting the bullseye of a giant
dartboard.

A salesgirl of Moroccan origin in the boutique told
MEW that there had been no casualties when the missile struck, as the
apartments were empty at the time. More important, the missile did not
explode. Passers-by the day after the attack said the missile could be
seen lodged in the upper floors of the building. Damage to the two
apartments was extensive, but neither of the adjoining buildings on either
side appears uninhabitable. The two shops on the ground floor were
functioning normally, having suffered only minor damage.

An Iraqi military communique confirmed the January 19
attacks with the following words:

These missiles poured out of the sky, making Tel Aviv
and other targets a crematorium last night, the night of 18 January. The
missile attack on Tel Aviv was repeated at 0800 and 0815 (0500 and 0515
GMT) this morning.16

The Third and Most Damaging
Attack: January 22At 8:37 pm on January 22, Tel
Aviv was hit by one Iraqi missile, which was not intercepted by the two
Patriots fired at it.17 It was reported that three civilians
were killed in this attack, two of them from indirect causes.18
The number of civilians injured was variously reported as 73 by the IDF,
85 by the PCC, and 96 by the GPO.

This was the most damaging single Iraqi missile attack
on Israel, both in terms of the amount of destruction caused and civilian
deaths. Maariv recorded damage to 357 buildings
and 1,726 apartments, of which seven buildings and 61 apartments were
completely destroyed. Significantly, it was also the first time the newly
installed Patriot defensive missiles were fired at an incoming missile.

A detailed statement
on civilian casualties was aired on IDF Radio: "A total of 98 wounded
people were taken to five hospitals in the central district, of whom 48
have already been released.... 74 are slightly wounded; three sustained
medium injuries; two are critically wounded.... Three women have died. One
of them was taken to Ichilov Hospital in Tel Aviv, the second to Tel
HaShomer Hospital, and the third to Beilinson Hospital. The dead woman who
was taken to Ichilov Hospital died of crushing wounds as a result of the
explosion. The two other dead women suffered heart attacks as a result of
the missile impact."19

The missile landed on the corner of Abba Hillel Silver
Road and Bialik Street on the northern limit of Ramat Gan, within greater
Tel Aviv. It struck a middle-class housing development of three-story
apartment blocks. Some 600 meters from the impact site is the Diamond
Exchange, two tall, twin towers which are among the most prominent
landmarks in Tel Aviv and the nerve center of the country's most important
export earner. Tel Aviv's northern railway station, the terminus of the
main coastal line to Haifa, is about 1,150 meters away. In addition, the
impact site was only about 1.5 km from the position where the northernmost
set of Patriot batteries was located (another set was located south of the
city).

Confusing any speculation about a possible military
target of the missile is conflicting reports about whether the missile was
intercepted or deflected by a Patriot. IDF spokesman Brig. Gen. Shai, in a
live studio interview, said, "(t)he missile hit hard, very hard. It was a
direct hit on a residential home and its immediate vicinity. All in all,
approximately 20 buildings were hit." Asked whether Patriot missiles had
been able to intercept the missile(s), Shai responded that two Patriots
were launched from one of the batteries in the Tel Aviv area. As the
incoming missile achieved a direct hit, he assumed that it had not been
successfully intercepted; he therefore speculated that more than one
missile was launched, one of which had been hit, while the other had
continued unimpeded.20

Brig. Gen. Uri Ram, commander of the Antiaircraft
Forces, later claimed that the Patriot had changed the trajectory of the
Iraqi missile, and that it did not fall where it had been aimed. "After
the collision, it was reported that the Scud was destroyed, but later it
became apparent that its rear was hit, while the warhead continued on its
trajectory and exploded in Ramat Gan."21 The Israeli army
stated later that theengine had been destroyed by a Patriot missile but
that it had failed to destroy the warhead.22

The extent of the devastation caused by the impact and
explosion of the missile was difficult to reconstruct with accuracy, as
much of the rubble had been cleared away at the time of MEW's visit to the
site in early June and reconstruction was well advanced. A large area of
open ground, perhaps 150 by 150 meters, marks the impact site. Any crater
had been filled in already. The missile hit a three-story apartment block
on the edge of a small street, and four surrounding blocks -- each about
70 meters long by 25 meters deep -- were badly damaged, requiring
extensive reconstruction.

An old woman who lives about 150 meters from the
impact site described how the blast had brought a chandelier down on her
head. She suffered only minor injuries, and there was superficial damage
to her apartment. An Israeli of American origin, Irma Dothan, who works
nearby, said the blast was felt for several hundred meters. Windows were
blown out in a radius of at least 150 meters, she said.

An Iraqi military communique described the attack with
the following words:

For the sake of Palestine, and in implementation of
the will of the heroes of the children of the stones, its strugglers, and
its (word indistinct) and struggling women; for the sake of holy
Jerusalem, and in revenge for the crimes of Zionism, our missiles slammed
against the city of Tel Aviv, the city of vice and usurpation, to disturb
the sleep of the Zionists and blacken their night, after they distorted
the days of the Arabs and filled them with blood and peril, at 2115 last
night. Our missile launchers then withdrew safely.23No Casualties in the Fourth Attack: January
23This attack occurred at 9:50 pm on January 23. One
missile was fired at the Haifa area24 and was
successfully intercepted; there were no civilian casualties. The IDF said
on January 24 that "many pieces of debris were scattered throughout the
area over which the Scud was destroyed, causing a certain degree of
property damage."

According to Israel Radio, an Iraqi missile was
launched at the Haifa area and intercepted by two Patriot missiles. There
were no injuries, but, in many apartments, windows were shattered.25
An Army spokesman claimed that the missile was successfully intercepted by
Patriot missiles and that there were no casualties. There was some damage,
however, "because the blast of the explosion and the shards of the missile
were dispersed in all directions."

Although the IDF did not specify where over northern
Israel the incoming missile had been intercepted, it is believed to have
been on the prominent Carmel headland overlooking Haifa. The Carmel is an
area of mixed Arab (primarily Druze) and Jewish settlement in small,
widely scattered villages and other communities such as kibbutzim.
Israel's main oil refinery, petrochemical plants, a shipyard and several
other key industries are located around a bay below the headland, close to
the city. High-tech defense industries are also nearby.

This was the first
successful use of the Patriot during the Gulf war. According to a British
businessman who visited the city regularly during the conflict, the
Patriot batteries were placed in a location on the top of the hill over
which Haifa spreads, commanding an excellent angle of fire at missiles
coming in from the east. This defensive location, together with the
difficult angle of access to key targets in and around Haifa and the
thinly populated Carmel hinterland in front of the Patriot defensive
batteries, account for the negligible success encountered by the Iraqis in
attacking these targets in northern Israel as well as the ensuing small
amount of collateral damage.

Iraq did not name the targets in Haifa that were the
object of this attack. A military communique issued by the Armed Forces
General Command described the attack in the following terms:

If they insist on denying the rights of our people in
Iraq and Palestine...then we have no choice but to repel evil in kind and
drive it back to those who have started in defense of our territories and
dignity. Thus we struck yesterday and we will continue to strike until
they stop their aggression....

Our heroic missile force dealt a number of blows
against selected targets in occupied Palestine as follows: a blow to
selected targets in Haifa port inside the occupied Palestinian
territories. Our missiles hit their targets and destroyed them at 2300
yesterday. 26

Wide Collateral Damage in the
Fifth Attack: January 25The attack at 6:02 pm on
January 25 was the first massive missile attack on Israel since the
Patriot batteries were installed. Iraq may have fired as many as seven
missiles,27 of which an uncertain number
--estimates range from four to seven -- were intercepted by Patriots.28
IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Dan Shomron, in a live interview, estimated
that altogether seven missiles were fired,29 but footnote 27 in
this chapter lays out the doubts on this score. One missile was launched
at Haifa30 and the others at Tel Aviv. Middle East
Watch was able to identify the locations where four of these missiles
landed: Ramat Chen, a southern district of Ramat Gan; Shechunat Hillel, in
central Ramat Gan; the central Tel Aviv beachfront; and the Geha junction
near Tel Hashomer, a suburb north of Tel Aviv. All Israeli sources
reported one fatality, but the number of injured was variously reported as
44 by Maariv, 66 by the IDF and 67 by PCC.31

Eyewitnesses -- both Tel Aviv residents and foreign
journalists --told MEW that "two or three" Patriots appeared to have been
fired at each incoming missile. There could therefore have been anywhere
from 15 to 20 missiles in combat over the heart of the city at the same
time. Heavy collateral damage was inevitable. Eyewitnesses told MEW that
debris and unexploded warheads from damaged missiles rained over a wide
area that night.

Discussing the attack, Gen. Shai, the IDF spokesman,
said it had been similar in scope to the first one: "The attack on our
civilian population in the northern and central part of the country caused
injuries to approximately 40 people -- most of whom suffered light wounds
-- andkilled one man."32 He added that a certain amount of
damage was also caused to property on the ground where missile debris fell
and was scattered over a wide radius.33

Analysis of the possible military targets that were
the objects of this attack is difficult, due to the discrepancy in the
estimated number of missiles involved and evidence that Patriot missiles
were responsible for a significant amount of damage and casualties. At
least one Patriot launched from the battery by the Yarkon river misfired,
landing in a built-up area of greater Tel Aviv.

The incoming missiles are likely to have been
deflected off course to varying degrees after collision with Patriots.
Certain observations can, nonetheless, be made: two of the four known hits
-- those in Ramat Gan -- were in densely populated residential
neighborhoods, far from any possible military target. A third missile
landed on the beachfront within a two-kilometer range of several important
government buildings, including the Defense Ministry complex. The fourth
missile landed to the north of the city in Tel HaShomer and could have
been aimed at either a major military industry complex or the intelligence
headquarters nearby, where several highly sensitive installations are
located.

A major highway from Ashkelon to Haifa -- the
principal artery linking northern and southern Israel -- was 1.7 km away
from the Ramat Chen site. The Shechunat Hillel attack was even further
from any conceivable legitimate military target -- innocent civilians were
the only victims.

Middle East Watch obtained information about the
missile that landed in Tel Hashomer. Local residents and a driver who
passed by the scene of the explosion, none of whom wanted to be
identified, told MEW that the missile landed just east of the main Tel
Aviv-Haifa highway, nearthe important Geha junction, in the Tel Hashomer
district. It apparently landed in an open area, alarming the few remaining
drivers heading out of Tel Aviv at the end of the day for what was
regarded as the relative safety of the northern suburban towns. The Jewish
Sabbath had already begun, and most people would have already been home.
The missile did not explode.

These partial accounts do not make clear, however,
whether it was only a section of the missile which landed or the entire
missile -- its warhead failing to explode. It also is not clear whether
the missile was an Iraqi missile or a Patriot. While Patriots are known to
have been fired from the Yarkon river batteries at incoming missiles, it
was not possible for MEW to determine whether this particular missile had
been intercepted and, if so, with what consequences.

Several potential military targets in the vicinity are
worth noting. Less than a kilometer away to the west are the factories of
Israel Military Industries (IMI) in Ramat HaSharon, an upper-middle-class
town. IMI is responsible, among many other weapons systems, for the
production of missiles and ordnance. A successful attack on this facility
would almost certainly have resulted in heavy civilian casualties from
secondary explosions. Another plausible target could have been the nearby
army recruiting center in Tel Hashomer, the largest in the country.
Equally possible, though, is that the missile could have landed on or near
the large Tel Hashomer general hospital which is also in the immediate
vicinity.

Iraq's military communique issued by the Armed Forces
General Command provided no information about the military targets of
these missiles launched on January 25:

This is in reply to those who stand behind the
aggression and encourage it and who directly participate in it with
military, political and media efforts. With a spirit of determination and
sacrifice, our mighty missile force carried out the following blows . .
.

1. A powerful missile blow dealt to the Zionists
in their capital, Tel Aviv.2. A second missile blow
also dealt to Tel Aviv.3. A missile blow dealt
to the occupied Haifa port.4. A third missile blow
also dealt to Tel Aviv.34

The Sixth Attack on January
26: Varying Figures, Unknown TargetsIn
the sixth attack, at 10:03 pm on January 26, Iraq reportedly launched some
four to eight missiles;35 of these, four reportedly were
intercepted and possibly another four struck ground.36 No civilian deaths
were reported;37 the IDF and the GPO said there were no
injuries, and the PCC said two were injured. Maariv reported no damage from these attacks,
while the GPO said damage was "minimal."

Least is known about this attack's targets, other than
that they appear to have been widely scattered. The Press Communications
Center referred to Tel Aviv and Haifa as the general target areas, while
the IDF limited itself to saying, "a number of missiles were fired at
Israel from western Iraq. The missiles were launched towards northern and
central Israel...in two separate salvos marked by a short interval of
time."

Gen. Shai said that a number of Patriots were fired at
the incoming Iraqi missiles. There were no reports of casualties.38
Even though all the missiles were said to have been intercepted, there was
still, however, some slight damage. An IDF Radio report stated that pieces
from an intercepted missile "fell in various areas, including Arab
villages. There have been reports of shattered windows in the north."39

Possible targets in central Israel may have been Ben
Gurion International Airport and its surrounding military installations,
some 15 kilometers due east of Tel Aviv. These include an air base, the
testing ground of Israel Aircraft Industries and several other defense
factories. These are large, and obvious, military targets well away from
civilian residential districts. But, in the absence of information as to
the impact sites, no conclusions can be drawn.

An Iraqi military statement issued by the Armed Forces
General Command used characteristic rhetoric to describe the attacks:

[T]wo missile strikes were directed at Tel Aviv, which
poured fire on the heads of the arrogant Zionists to avenge what their
hands have committed. At the same time, and with God's help, a missile was
directed at the occupied port of Haifa. After a short time, two
missilestrikes were directed at Tel Aviv to pound the positions of the
filthy Zionists.40

Two Missiles Land in Occupied
West Bank: January 28 and January 31The
next two attacks, involving one missile each, took place at 9:15 pm on
January 28 and 6:05 pm on January 31. These attacks are grouped together
here as they display similar characteristics. Each consisted of the firing
of one missile, which landed in the occupied West Bank, not far from the
1967 "Green Line" border. One possible explanation for the fact that the
missiles fell short of Israeli territory is the range from which they were
launched. It may be that coalition bombing raids on suspected
missile-launching sites in western Iraq from where the initial attacks
were launched -- known as H-2 and H-3 -- forced Iraq to fire from further
away, at the extreme end of the missile's range. Civilian damage is
believed to have been minimal.

On January 28, a missile struck near the village of
Deir Ballout, 22 kilometers due east of Tel Aviv and nine kilometers from
the nearest major Israeli city, Petah Tikva, in the central Dan region of
the country. An Israeli military spokesman said Iraq had fired a missile
at "Israel's central sector and that its shrapnel had dispersed over Arab
locations on both sides of the Green Line." He stated that no damage or
injuries were reported and that no Patriot missiles had been fired.41
The IDF was said to be investigating why Patriots were not fired during
this missile attack.

Of all the attacks described in a chronology published
by the Government Press Office, as distributed by the Israeli
Consulate-General in New York, only the description of this attack
specifically names the place hit. It was also the only attack for which
the government-controlled radio announced the exact site of impact. An
explanation for this may be the fact that it fell in the West Bank,
Palestinians having given vocal support to Saddam Hussein.An
Iraqi military communique said the missile was fired at Tel Aviv:

With God's help, our heroic missile forces launched a
missile strike against the dens of the enemy and the desecrators of the
dear land of Palestine in the city of Tel Aviv before midnight
yesterday.42

In the January 31 attack, a missile landed in, or
near, the village of Harbata, five kilometers east of the Green Line. The
nearest Israeli town is Lod, 12 kilometers away. Some reports the
following day suggested that the missile had deviated from its course
because of strong winds. Although there were no reports of casualties or
serious damage, "a few window panes were shattered by the blast."43
An Israeli Army spokesman said that the missile landed east of the Green
Line, in the occupied West Bank, but he would not specify the exact
location.44 An Israeli television correspondent
reported from the site of impact that the missile had fallen "near one of
the Arab villages in Samaria [the official Israeli designation for the
northern West Bank]," and that it struck "an open field."45

With this attack, the army said it would no longer
announce whether Patriot missiles had been fired at incoming missiles, on
the grounds that launches could tell the Iraqis where Patriot batteries
were positioned and, by deduction, where missiles had landed.46
As with theattack of three days earlier, it is believed that Patriots were
again not fired on January 31.

An Iraqi military communique said that the attack
"pounded Tel Aviv with the giant al-Husayn rockets so that the Islamic,
Arab, and Iraqi anger will fall on the heads of the Zionists."47

No Casualties or Damage
Reported: Attacks on Night of February 2-3Little information was released about these two
consecutive attacks. According to the Israeli authorities, Iraq fired a
missile at Israel on February 2 at 8:20 p.m. and hit an unsettled part of
area Hey, the code word indicating the Negev
desert.48 IDF Spokesman Gen. Shai confirmed that
one missile had been fired and that it had not caused any deaths or
damage.49 The report that the missile landed
somewhere in the southern Negev desert was in sharp contrast to Iraq's
claim that Tel Aviv was the target:

In response to the enemy attacks and to avenge the
Arab blood in Iraq and Palestine, your heroic missile force last night
used al-Husayn missiles to deal a devastating blow to Tel Aviv, the
capital of the usurper and occupying Zionist entity.50

Later that night, at 1:37 am on the early morning of
February 3, another missile was launched from western Iraq towards Israel.
An IDF spokesman said that to the best of his knowledge, "there were no
casualties and only minor damage, if at all."51 An Iraqi military
spokesmen said, again, that Tel Aviv was the target: "Further to the
statement issued this morning, 3 February, our heroic missile force dealt
another blow to the city of Tel Aviv with al-Husayn missiles at dawn
today."52

Iraq Claims Another Attack:
February 6At least three Iraqi military
communiques claimed that a missile strike was launched against the port of
Haifa on the night of February 6. The Israeli Army, however, denied that
any Iraqi missiles had struck Haifa or anywhere else inside Israeli
territory:

An alleged fresh Iraqi missile attack on the northern
Israeli port of Haifa has apparently turned out to be an act of political
propaganda by Baghdad this evening. `Nothing is known of a missile attack
here,' a spokesman for the Israeli Army told DPA in response to an
inquiry. The sirens did not not sound in the Haifa area or anywhere else
in the country.53

MEW has no independent evidence that this attack took
place.

Iraq made repeated claims that the port of Haifa was
hit in this attack. For example, an Iraqi military spokesman said that
night:In response to the call of
duty to our Palestinian Arab people and in triumph for the Iraqi martyrs
who havefallen victim to the bestial American-Zionist aggression, our
heroic missile force dealt a destructive blow with al-Husayn missiles this
evening on the heads of the wretched Zionists in the city of Haifa in
occupied Palestine.54

Extensive Civilian Damage in
the Eleventh Attack: February 9One missile reportedly was
fired at 2:40 am on February 9. It was reported as having been intercepted
but also as having struck ground. Two explosions on the ground, in close
proximity to one another, were recorded, suggesting that one might have
been a Patriot warhead.

Civilians injured during this attack were variously
reported as 20 (Israeli media), 25 (GPO), 26 (PCC), and 27 (Maariv). There were no fatalities. Civilian damage
was extensive, given that only one enemy missile was involved. Maariv said that 287 buildings (with a total of
1,111 apartments) were damaged, and seven buildings were completely
destroyed.

The location of the missile strike was the borders of
Ramat Gan and Bnei Brak municipalities, east of Tel Aviv city. The impact
site is recorded as having been off HaRoen, a major road in central Ramat
Gan, but much of the destruction spilled over into Bnei Brak, with which
this district merges imperceptibly. Bnei Brak is dominated by
ultra-Orthodox Jewish seminaries and religious-student homes. The Burmese
Embassy in Ramat Gan, 400 meters from the missile's point of impact, was
virtually destroyed, according to Israeli eyewitnesses who drove along the
main road a few days later.

As MEW was unable to inspect the embassy site, it is
unclear whether a separate warhead was responsible for the embassy's
destruction or simply a large piece of debris from a mid-air explosion.
Breaking apolicy decision announced on January 31, an IDF spokesman said
that several Patriot missiles were fired at the incoming Iraqi missile,
and the government-controlled media acknowledged that large amounts of
debris fell across a wide area of Bnei Brak and Ramat Gan.

No obvious military targets are in the vicinity of the
impact sites. If the intended target was further west, in Tel Aviv proper,
the only possible target of a military nature would have been the Defense
Ministry complex. However, on the evidence of previous attacks, the
chances of hitting even this large area with a missile fired from western
Iraq were slim.

An Iraqi military spokesman said of the
attack:

[O]ur heroic missile force at dawn today launched a
destructive strike with al-Husayn missiles at Tel Aviv, the capital of the
Zionist entity, to avenge the intifadah and Iraqi martyrs.55

To this, a military communique added:

[O]ur valiant missile force directed a destructive
strike at the city of Tel Aviv, the capital of fornication, in
implementation of the will of the children of the intifadah and the will
of their brothers in Iraq....56

Two Attacks in Rapid
Succession: February 11 and February 12Two
missiles were fired, at 6:52 pm on February 11 and at 1:27 am on February
12. One of the missiles was intercepted,57 two wererecorded as
having struck ground,58 and there was one explosion on the
ground. No deaths were reported; injuries were put at six by the GPO and
seven by the PCC. Damage to private housing around the area of impact of
the second missile was extensive. According to Maariv, 375 houses were damaged in one form or
another, 35 of them suffered moderate to severe damage. In addition, 436
apartments were slightly damaged from the effects of the blast.

The IDF Spokesman's office said the missile struck "a
non-settled area in the center of the country," as a result of which
windows in several buildings were smashed. A statement issued that day did
not disclose whether an intercept had been attempted.

Local residents interviewed by MEW saw a missile
flying overhead in the general area of Herzliya, but were unable to locate
its impact site. They thought that it either ended up offshore -- some
believed they saw a missile going into the sea -- or succeeded in striking
a sensitive military target which the IDF did not want to reveal. The most
important such target in the vicinity, as described in the attacks of
January 18 and 25, would have been the intelligence headquarters a few
kilometers away.

Gen. Shomron, IDF Chief of Staff, stated only that
there were no casualties and no damage in this attack. When asked about
the firing of Patriots, he replied, "We do not report on the firing of
Patriots...."59

More details were publicly released about the second
attack, six and a half hours later, after an inadvertent disclosure by the
U.S. State Department in Washington that the missile had landed near the
Savyon home of Defense Minister Moshe Arens, then visiting Washington.60
Such was the importance of the neighborhood that top officers rushed to
the scene.

IDF Spokesman Gen. Shai reported, "I am now at the
site of the attack. The chief of staff and other senior officers are also
here. The situation at this moment is that a missile hit a residential
area. There are several casualties who sustained light injuries, and one
or two who might have medium wounds." Gen. Shomron, who was also at the
scene, pointed out that there had been two attacks during a single night,
"which is quite unique....There was a hit very close to a house."61
The Army Radio said later that one man who had been completely buried
under the rubble of his house was rescued unharmed -- a picture
transmitted around the world.62

A wealthy residential suburb due east of Tel Aviv,
Savyon is about nine kilometers northeast of Ben Gurion international
airport and its surrounding complex of military facilities and factories.
If these facilities had been the intended target (and there is no way of
gauging the Iraqi intent from the evidence available) the attack was
highly inaccurate.

An Iraqi military spokesman said of the two
attacks:

So that the Zionists -- the instigators of all evil --
receive their share of just punishment, your heroic missile force used
al-Husayn missiles to deal a destructive strike to Tel Aviv last night to
sow death and alarm in the hearts of those who have isolated our women and
children in the occupied land and who are today trying to commit
aggression against Iraq's free women and its children....63
After midnight last night, our heroicmissile force directed a second blow
at Tel Aviv, the capital of the Zionist villains.64

A military communique issued by the Armed Forces
General Command added:

[O]ur heroic missile force yesterday evening pounded
the city of Tel Aviv, the capital of the Zionist entity, with al-Husayn
missiles to spread death and terror among those who terrorized our nation,
defied its will, and desecrated its holy shrines....[A]fter midnight last
night, our heroic missile forces once again pounded the city of Tel Aviv
with al-Husayn missiles.65

An Apparently Harmless
Attack: February 16Reportedly as many as four
missiles were fired in this nighttime attack at 8:16 pm.66
One of the missiles was intercepted,67 and two were
recorded as having struck ground, but the number of explosions on the
ground is unknown. There were no reports of civilian casualties or
civilian damage. According to the Government Press Office, the two
missiles were launched in a coordinated attack. One was said to have
landed in the south of the country in an open area. Parts of the other
onewere officially said to have fallen into the sea in the north of the
country. No injuries or damage were reportedly caused by either missile.68

Asked about Iraq's claim that one of the missiles was
fired at the Dimona nuclear research and weapons plant, IDF Spokesman Gen.
Shai replied, "I cannot go beyond that point, which is that one of the
missiles landed in the southern part of the country." According to an
Israeli journalist who asked not to be identified, one missile in fact
struck the ground near the central Negev town of Arad, a small town of
about 10,000 people 18 km southwest of the Dead Sea. Arad is the location
of a major airbase. The Dimona nuclear plant is more than 30 km away, to
the southwest. The IDF confirmed Iraq's claim that a modified Soviet Scud,
dubbed by Iraq the hijarah al-sijjil, had been
responsible for the attack in the south.

Another missile was fired towards Haifa. But, as with
previous attacks, it failed to reach its destination. An IDF account spoke
of a missile as having "fragmented," suggesting that this one broke up of
its own accord prior to hitting the ground.

Baghdad Radio said the following day that Iraq had
used a new missile to attack Israel on February 16: "It named the missile
as the Hijarah al-Sijjil (shale stone), a
reference to a story in the Koran in which God sent giant birds to drop
shale stones on invaders who attacked the Kaaba, Islam's holiest
shrine."69 A military communique issued by the
Armed Forces General Command stated:

Since the Zionists are behind every crime that is
committed against the sons of Iraq and the nation and they stand behind
this aggression...our heroic missile force directed the following strikes
missiles [sic] at the Zionist entity:

Three destructive strikes on Dimona, in the south of
occupied Palestine, where the Israeli reactor dedicated to war purposes is
located, yesterday evening with Hijarat al-Sijjil ... missiles. One strike
on the port of Haifa, on the Mediterranean, in occupied Palestine,
yesterday evening, with al-Husayn missiles.70

The Fifteenth Attack:
February 19This attack was recorded at
7:55 pm, with one missile fired. According to Israeli data, there were no
civilian casualties or damage. Little is known about this attack, except
that Patriots apparently successfully intercepted the Iraqi missile
somewhere over "central Israel." An Iraqi military statement
said:

[S]ince it is Zionism which stands in the way of the
peace opportunities provided by Iraq, in expression of our country's
capability, in embodiment of its invincible power by the will of God, and
in implementation of our people and nation's determination to take revenge
from all criminal tyrants, our heroic missile force has dealt a
destructive blow to the city of Tel Aviv, the capital of the Zionists. Our
missiles destroyed their targets.71

Sixteenth Attack: February
23One missile came in at 6:50 pm on February 23; it was
not intercepted and was recorded as striking ground and exploding. There
were no civilian casualties and only "minimal" damage, according to the
GPO.

Information gathered by MEW from reliable Israeli
sources is that the missile landed, apparently unimpeded, near the moshav
(rural cooperative) of Bareket, in central Israel, four kilometers east of
the perimeter of Ben Gurion international airport. This attack marked
theclosest known hit to the airport and its surrounding military
facilities. (Apart from the Savyon attack on February 12, Israeli
censorship of the precise locations hit by the three other missiles said
to have landed in "central Israel" makes difficult the task of determining
whether there was a pattern of attacks near the airport.)

The official Israeli word was that this missile landed
in an unpopulated area in the center of the country, where it caused a
fire to break out.72 An Iraqi military spokesman described
the attack with the following words:

With the aim of punishing the Zionist scoundrels, who
are behind every crime, plot, and aggression committed against this nation
and the great people of Iraq, and because the Zionists have conspired
through their intrigues and puppets against the chances for peace Iraq
called for, our heroic missile force this evening dealt a destructive
strike to Tel Aviv, the capital of the Zionist entity, with al-Husayn
missiles.73

The Last Missiles: Early
Morning Hours of February 25The last missiles launched at
Israel by Iraq were fired in the early morning of February 25. It was
reported that one missile was fired at Israel at 3:37 am and caused no
damage or injuries as it fell in an unpopulated area in the south.74
A second missile was fired about two hours later, at 5:36 am, and also hit
a region in the south. Like thefirst, it was reported by Israel to have
fallen in an open field. There were said to be no casualties, and no
damage was reported.75

Later, however, the IDF claimed that only one missile
had fallen in southern Israel and that it had caused no damage or
casualties.76 MEW has no independent evidence as to
the exact location of these strikes, or explanation as to why the initial
reference to a second missile was dropped.

An Iraqi military spokesman said that the intended
target was, once again, the Dimona nuclear facility:

[O]ur heroic missile force directed a destructive blow
with the al-Husayn, al-Hijarah missiles at the Zionist entity,
specifically at the Dimona area, the site of the Zionist nuclear reactor
used for military purposes.

LEGAL STANDARDS AND
CONCLUSIONS

Middle East Watch believes that we are aware of the
precise or general location of impact of two thirds (26) of the missiles
that Iraq fired at Israel during the war. Fourteen, or nearly half, of
these 26 were not intercepted by defensive missiles, according to
eyewitnesses, Israeli journalists or the government's published account.
Assessments of accuracy, or the extent to which the Iraqi military
planners may have taken into account the possibility of civilian
casualties when aiming missiles at targets in Israel, are therefore drawn
from this base of unintercepted attacks.

A further seven of the 26 missiles are known to have
been knocked off course to varying degrees by Patriots after mid-air
collisions or explosions, negating their significance for interpretative
purposes. Confusion exists over whether the remaining five Iraqi missiles
were intercepted, and they are thus also excluded from this
analysis.

In assessing the intent of Iraq's missile strikes, the
quality of information at Saddam Hussein's disposal as to the location of
military targets in Israel needs to be taken into account. In this
context, the following statement by the Iraqi leader -- made in the spring
of 1990 to the visiting PLO chief Yasser Arafat -- is of
significance:

Iraq is familiar with every inch of Palestine, every
[Israeli] airfield, base, factory and research facility. We have been able
to photograph all the targets we need, deep inside Israel. We started to
do this when the war with Iran ended. Israel knows, and we know she
knows.77

Despite this confident comment, the estimated 39 Iraqi
missiles failed, to the best of MEW's knowledge, to strike a single
military target.

Attacks on Civilian
TargetsMany of the Iraqi missiles appear to have been
directed at civilian targets. The marked preference for targets in the
heavily populated region around Tel Aviv, when numerous military targets
were available outside these urban centers, suggests a deliberate decision
to harm civilians. This conclusion is only reinforced by the rhetoric
accompanying the missile attacks, which suggested that the Iraqi military
had at best an indifference to the plight of the civilian population of
Israel, if not a deliberate desire to cause as much civilian damage and
suffering as possible. Firing missiles with the purpose of harming
civilians flatly violates the customary-law rule that "[t]he civilian
population as such, as well as individual civilians, shall not be the
object of attack" (Article 51(2) of Protocol I).

Given the apparent targeting of residential areas,
Iraq also appeared to select times to launch attacks when most Israelis
would be at home, and thus the likelihood that civilian casualties would
result from attacks on civilian residences would be greatest. All attacks
against Israeltook place during the hours of darkness, between 6:00 pm and
5:30 am, with one exception: the second attack, on January 19, which
occurred at 7:15 am. While an obvious reason for these nighttime attacks
was the Iraqi desire to avoid allied aerial surveillance in western Iraq,
an intention to maximize harm to civilians may also have played a role. A
similar rationale may have played a role in the bunching of Iraqi missile
attacks (eight of the 17 separate attacks registered by MEW) during the
Jewish Sabbath, either Friday evening or Saturday morning. These actions
are in violation of the duty to take all feasible precautions to avoid
civilian casualties (Article 57, Protocol I).

There is also evidence to suggest that Iraq was
targeting Jewish civilians in particular. Apart from the obvious effort to
avoid sending missiles toward Jerusalem -- which apart from its large
Palestinian population also has some of the holiest sites in Islam which
the Iraqis would have been loath to hit -- care appears to have been taken
not to direct missiles toward exclusively Arab population centers in
Israel. While 22 of the 39 missiles struck different parts of Tel Aviv,
none came within a kilometer of Yafo (Jaffa), the largely Arab-populated
municipality in the southwest of the metropolis. Two Iraqi missiles fell
short of Israel and landed in the occupied West Bank on January 28 and 31,
while at least one other caused indirect damage to Arab villages in
eastern Israel, not far from the Green Line, on January 26. However,
technical difficulties or problems of range may have accounted for these
deviations from the usual pattern.

The Use of Indiscriminate
MissilesEven many of the missiles that might have been
directed toward military targets were indiscriminate, in violation of the
laws of armed conflict, in that they could not reasonably have been
directed away from civilians and civilian objects. For example, the four
missiles fired during the first two rounds of attack, on January 18 and
19, before the arrival of the U.S. Patriots, landed within 1.5 kilometers
of the Defense Ministry complex, the Kirya, suggesting that some effort
may have been made to hit this facility. Similarly, three missiles landed
between one and two kilometers from Israel's intelligence center, north of
Tel Aviv, near Ramat HaSharon -- if one missile believed to have gone into
the sea near Herzliya-Pittuach and another intercepted missile are
included.

However, as noted, the customary-law principle
codified in Article 51(4)(b) of Protocol I prohibits attacks as
"indiscriminate" which use "method[s] or means of combat which cannot be
directed at a specific military objective" and thus "are of a nature to
strike military objectives and civilians or civilian objects without
distinction." The Iraqi-modified Scud missiles used against Israel and
Saudi Arabia had a circular error probable (CEP) of 1000 meters, meaning
that 50 percent of the missiles launched could be expected to fall within
a 1000 meter radius of the point targeted. While a CEP of this magnitude
may be adequate if the military object targeted is either very large or is
located in a desolate area without a surrounding civilian population --
such as the possible attacks on the Dimona nuclear facility -- it is
wholly inadequate if used against a relatively small target in a populated
urban area such as Tel Aviv and its environs, since 50 percent of the
missiles would not come within even one kilometer of the target.

In fact, when missiles exploded on the ground without
interference from any defensive system, they rarely succeeded, to MEW's
knowledge, in getting even within one kilometer of any possible legitimate
military target, despite the fact that central Israel is densely packed
with military bases and defense factories. None of the attacks
investigated by MEW, or studied on the basis of reliable information
provided by Israelis, resulted in damage to a military facility.

The condemnation of these attacks as, at best,
indiscriminate --and quite possibly direct attacks on civilians -- does
not depend on an assessment of Iraq's goals in attacking Israel or Saudi
Arabia. Although Iraq might claim in the case of Israel that it sought a
military advantage from its missile attacks -- to split the military
coalition against it by prompting Israel to attack Iraq -- those
objectives do not justify indiscriminate attacks on civilians. Just as it
would be illegal for allied forces to harm Iraqi civilians with the aim of
encouraging them to overthrow Saddam, as explained in Part Two of this
report, so it is improper for Iraq to target civilians in Israel or Saudi
Arabia with the aim of furthering Iraq's military or political
objectives.

Terrorizing the Civilian
PopulationThe rhetoric accompanying the
Iraqi missile attacks on Israel suggest an effort to terrorize the
civilian population. For example, an official Iraqi military communique of
January 19 described the previousnight's attack on Tel Aviv as "missiles
pour[ing] out of the sky, making Tel Aviv and other targets a
crematorium." A similar image was conjured up by Saddam Hussein in his
April 1, 1990, speech, when he threatened to "make fire eat up half of
Israel" if it attacked Iraq. An Iraqi military communique issued on
January 23 stated that a purpose of an attack the previous night was "to
disturb the sleep of the Zionists and blacken their night." Following a
missile launching on February 11, Radio Baghdad said that the strike was
intended "to sow death and alarm in the hearts of those who have isolated
our women and children in the occupied land," a reference to the
round-the-clock curfew in force in the West Bank and Gaza Strip at the
time. The Iraqi Armed Forces General Command stated that the missiles
launched against Israel on February 12 were intended "to spread death and
terror among those who terrorized our nation."

These comments, when coupled with ongoing missile
attacks and the ever-present possibility that these missiles might be
armed with chemical weapons, appear to have been made deliberately to
spread terror among the civilian populations, in violation of the
customary-law principle codified in Article 51(2) of Protocol I. This
would be a violation regardless of whether any particular attack was aimed
at a military or civilian target.

The Role of the
PatriotsWhile the Patriots provided an obvious psychological
boost to Israelis who felt helpless in the face of the Iraqi missile
barrages, their use may have contributed to greater harm to civilian life
and property than would have been the case had no attempt been made to
defend against the incoming missiles. In at least one case, on January 25,
a Patriot misfired, failed to connect with an enemy missile, and landed in
a built-up area; neither the Israeli nor the U.S. government has
acknowledged this malfunction. Moreover, in the case of Tel Aviv, the
Patriots, even when they functioned properly, intercepted Iraqi missiles
over densely populated areas, with the result that debris, at times
explosive, fell on civilians. The practice of launching several Patriots
to meet an incoming Iraqi missile compounded this effect. However, this
was not a problem in the case of Haifa, because the configuration of the
city and the placement of the Patriots allowed them to intercept the
incoming Iraqi missiles over territory that was lightly
populated.

1 The
figure is arbitrary, as Israel chose to classify attacks separated by a
period of under an hour as one, but those of the night of February 2 to 3
and February 25 as two each. For classification purposes, as the last two
attacks were only two hours apart, and may have landed in the same
vicinity, MEW has chosen to treat them as one; 17 attacks are thus
analyzed in this report.

2 What
remains unclear is whether these 39 were all separate missiles, some of
which broke up into several parts, spontaneously or after collision with
Patriots. A missile that landed between Yona and HaRoen streets in Ramat
Gan on February 9, for instance, is also blamed for the complete
destruction of the Burmese Embassy 400 meters away. Debris was scattered
over a wide section of neighboring Bnei Brak. But only one hit was
recorded that night by an Israeli TV crew on the spot.

3 MEW
interview with Col. Raanan Gissin, Tel Aviv, June 4, 1991.

4 "The
Missiles That Hit Israel: A Sum-Up of Damages," March 29, 1991. MEW
translation from Hebrew.

5 MEW
interview, Tel Aviv, June 4, 1991.

6 The
17.5-foot-long Patriot surface-to-air missile has a launch weight of 2,200
pounds. (Edward Luttwak and Stuart L. Koehl, The
Dictionary of Modern War, Harper Collins:1991 at 451.) The Soviet Scud
B, which Iraq modified, has a launch weight of 14,050 pounds. (Id. at 513.)

7 MEW
telephone interview with Leslie Cockburn, June 15, 1991. These details
were also confirmed by the videotape of the incident.

8 Patriots
have a maximum range of 37.3 miles and a height envelope of 500-78,750
feet. (Edward Luttwak and Stuart L. Koehl, The
Dictionary of Modern War, Harper Collins: 1991 at 451.)

9 U.S.
Patriot batteries were installed after the first two attacks by Iraq. They
were first fired against the incoming missiles on January 22 from
positions on the northern and southern outskirts of Tel Aviv, near the
coast.

10 "The
Missiles That Hit Israel: A Sum-Up of Damages," March 29, 1991.

11 Id.

12 Many
injuries in this attack resulted from panic and near absence of warning. A
number of people are known, for instance, to have suffered from an
anti-nerve gas agent with which they injected themselves.

13
Communique No. 4, Baghdad Domestic Service in Arabic, January 18, 1991, as
reported in FBIS, January 18, 1991 at 26.

14 Maariv's chart, published on March 29, 1991,
stated that five missiles were involved,
although it is not clear whether this represents missiles launched, or
landed.

15 From
MEW's own observation, at least one missile -- the one which struck
Allenby Street, in downtown Tel Aviv -- did not explode.

17 At a
press conference on January 23, the IDF spokesman said, inter alia, "An Iraqi Scud missile was launched on
Tuesday evening, January 22, 1991, at 8.30 pm. The missile hit a densely
populated residential area in the heart of the greater Tel Aviv area....
Two Patriot missiles were launched towards the Scud missile but did not
succeed in downing it." Ricochet, publication
of the IDF Spokesman's office, Tel Aviv.

18 The
IDF initially said that three deaths resulted from heart attacks suffered
by elderly people. However, it later transpired that the woman taken to
Ichilov Hospital in Tel Aviv died of being crushed by debris. This was a
direct cause of death, meaning that the total number of direct fatalities
from the attack should be increased from one to two.

19
Jerusalem Voice of Israel & IDF Radio, January 23, 1991, as reported
in FBIS, January 23, 1991 at 28.

20
Jerusalem Israel Television Network, January 22, 1991, as reported in
FBIS, January 23, 1991 at 27.

21
Jerusalem Voice of Israel & IDF Radio, January 23, 1991, as reported
in FBIS, January 24, 1991 at 30.

27
Accounts vary, possibly due to at least one Patriot having misfired and
landed in a built-up area of Tel Aviv without either striking the enemy
missile or self-destructing. On January 26, the IDF referred explicitly to
seven Iraqi missiles as having been fired. A log kept by an Israeli TV
crew records eight possible missiles, the same number as that given by the
Government Press Office. On the other hand, MEW
found concrete evidence for no more than five missiles as either having
been intercepted in the air or exploded on the ground -- and there may
have been fewer. Baghdad Radio refers only to four missiles, specifying
that three were fired at Tel Aviv and one at Haifa.

28 IDF
spokesman Brig. Gen. Shai reported on January 26 that all of the Iraqi
missiles "were hit in one way or another" by the Patriots. Other reliable
press sources, however, insist that no more than four were intercepted.
The discrepancies may indicate Israel's reluctance to admit to the
likelihood that muchof the heavy damage caused by this attack was due to
the use of an anti-missile defensive system over a major metropolitan
area.

29
Jerusalem Israel Television network, January 25, 1991, as reported in
FBIS, January 28, 1991 at 49.

30
Little information is available about the one missile believed to have
been fired in the direction of Haifa. It is thought to have been
intercepted by a Patriot, exploding either in the air or on the ground. Maariv reported that 700 apartments and 200 shops
were damaged.

31 All
the casualties were in Tel Aviv, none in Haifa.

32 It is
unclear whether this person died as a direct result of the missile blast
or as an indirect result through, for instance, a heart attack. If the
former, he would be the third direct fatality.

33
Jerusalem Voice of Israel & IDF Radio, January 25, 1991 as reported in
FBIS, January 28, 1991 at 48.

35 An
Iraqi communique referred to five missiles, while Israeli estimates range
from four to eight. A film crew's log refers to six, four of which were
intercepted. The Government Press Office spoke of four missiles as having
been launched, while Defense Minister Moshe Arens said in a live
television interview that "seven, perhaps eight, Scuds had been fired". He
added that Patriots had intercepted "some of them." On February 3, Maj. Gen. Ehud Barak, then Deputy Chief
of Staff, said that in the first nine days of the war (covering the
attacks from January 18-26) "approximately 25 missiles were fired towards
Israel." Retrospectively this gives a good fix on the actual numbers and
suggests that the total on January 26 was no more than five, more likely
four. By the same calculation, the previous day's attack can not have
registered more than six enemy missiles, rather than the eight stated by
the government.

36 Maariv says three hits were recorded in "central
Israel" and one in the vicinity of Haifa.

37 The
IDF said on January 26 that, to date, the Iraqi missile attacks had
resulted in four deaths and 192 injuries. No further explanations were
given as to how these figures were reached. Assuming that the criteria for
evaluating deaths directly attributable to the enemy attacks had not
changed, this infers that two of those injured in previous attacks
subsequently died of their wounds. However, on February 3, Maj. Gen. Barak
spoke of only two deaths resulting directly from missile hits, adding that
there had been 12 deaths from indirect causes.

38
Jerusalem Voice of Israel & IDF Radio, January 26, 1991, as reported
in FBIS, January 28, 1991 at 50.

48 Hey is the fifth letter of the Hebrew alphabet. In
order to expedite civil defense orders while maintaining curbs on the
disclosure of potentially valuable information, the country was divided
into six regions. In this way, the army could designate generally which
area had been hit without revealing where the missile had landed. The
alphabetic designations were: Aleph/Tel Aviv;
Beth/Jerusalem; Gimmel/Haifa; Dalet/nonurban areas in northern Israel; and Hey/Negev.

49
Jerusalem Voice of Israel & IDF Radio, February 2, 1991, as reported
in FBIS, February 4, 1991 at 52.

50
Statement read by announcer, Baghdad Domestic Service, February 3, 1991,
as reported by FBIS, February 4, 1991 at 33.

51
Jerusalem Voice of Israel & IDF Radio, February 3, 1991, as reported
in FBIS, February 4, 1991 at 52.

52
Statement read by announcer, Baghdad Domestic Service, February 3, 1991,
as reported in FBIS, February 4, 1991 at 33.

53
Hamburg DPA, February 6, 1991, as reported in FBIS, February 7, 1991 at
20.

54
Statement by military spokesman, Baghdad Domestic Service, February 6,
1991, as reported in FBIS, February 7, 1991 at 11. Also see statement by a military spokesman, Baghdad
Domestic Service, February 7, 1991, as reported in FBIS, February 7, 1991
at 12; Communique No. 40, Baghdad Domestic Service, February 7, 1991, as
reported in FBIS, February 8, 1991 at 19.

55
Statement by military spokesman, Baghdad Domestic Service, February 9,
1991, as reported in FBIS, February 11, 1991 at 34.

57 The
missile fired on the early evening of February 11 was intercepted, but may
have landed in the sea. The second missile, a few hours later, apparently
aimed at the same vicinity, was not intercepted.

58 The
GPO chronology notes that the first missile landed, and the PCC speaks
vaguely of "central Israel."

59
Israel Television Network, February 11, 1991, as reported in FBIS,
February 12, 1991 at 45.

60 The
Government of Israel Press Office News Release, February 28, 1991,
Information Department, Consulate General of Israel in New York.

61
Jerusalem Voice of Israel & IDF Radio, February 12, 1991, as reported
in FBIS, February 12, 1991 at 46.

62 Id.

63
Statement read by announcer, Baghdad Domestic Service, February 12, 1991,
as reported in FBIS, February 12, 1991 at 26.

66 Iraq
claimed to have launched four: three in the Negev, towards Dimona, and the
fourth towards Haifa. Gen. Shai, the IDF spokesman, confused the issue,
however, by saying that while Iraq claimed to have fired three, Israel could confirm that only two had
landed.

67 One
interception was recorded by a foreign television network as having taken
place. This may have been the missile aimed at Haifa.

68 The
Government of Israel Press Office News Release, February 28, 1991,
Information Department, Consulate General of Israel in New York.